Why are Ants Eating my Toothpaste???

This is gross, but it’s been going on for far too long and I need answers: if you were an ant, WHY, in the name of all that is good and holy and pure, would you choose to eat my toothpaste??? It has no nutritional value! There is nothing in it for an ant-y digestive system! Leave the green goo alone and go find another hobby!

I was somewhere in Vietnam when I ran out of travel-sized American toothpaste. I popped into the first little store I could find, and the grizzled woman behind the counter handed me a neon green box labeled “Colgate”.

“Yum, spearmint!” I foolishly said, and paid with a smile. Unfortunately, the green actually turned out to mean LIME flavor. Every morning and night since that fateful purchase, the citric acid tang tap dances badly around my tastebuds. I shudder and finish the job, reminding myself I hate waste and will not stoop to trashing a half-used product.

And yet, the taste that I abhor, the ants of Southeast Asia seem to adore. Every morning when I wake up after failing to thoroughly rinse the sink, I walk in to a raging ant party. If I had a magnifying glass, I bet I could see the little punks slugging plastic kegger cups of paste with drunken abandon. Shoot– I bet they’re even wearing little togas!

And they work fast. To take this photo, I just had to put down a sample Colgate bloop and wait five minutes. Yipes!

Anyway, I’m off now to buy cheap clothes at the Chiang Mai Sunday market with massage school buddies (and find mango sticky rice!). This should give the ants a little privacy to go wild on the sink dance floor. They just better be done gyrating to Britney by the time I come home!

Urgh, lime toothpaste! That sounds gross. I once had a gecko eat my toothpaste in India, it chewed a huge hole in it a made such a mess. I then replaced it with Indian toothpaste and bought a red tube because it was the closest thing to Colgate I could find. It turned out that the toothpaste inside was a browny red colour too and was like brushing my teeth with brick dust!

The ants may be mining the toothpaste for some mineral they need. Also if sugar was one of the ingredients….
But I think you are MEAN! Denying ants the right to brush their little teethies! (Sorry about the tease Lillie!)
STILL: The Society for the Rights of Ants will no doubt be contacting you!
Even worse:
When you threw it in the trash, the ants outside probably all rushed to the tube, unscrewed the cap, and threw a wild Baccanalian party, the likes of which Nero probably nevver even saw. Then they probably all brought some back to the nest for the queen! Woo Hoo!
THE GOOD THING: You did not get poisoned by the stuff! Ugh! I’d go rinse if i were you! You nevver know!
TAKE CARE!

Postscript: A kind soul on Twitter pointed out that fake versions of brand name products are rampant in Vietnam, and that my supposed “Colgate” was likely a shoddy (and possibly toxic) knockoff. He suggested I chuck the tube in the trash immediately, because one could only imagine what was in the paste. Oh how happy I was to hurl the green gel into the dumpster! The next toothpaste I purchased was legitimate, along with being minty, and I didn’t have the ant problem again. Hmm…

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Lovely to meet you! I’m Lillie Marshall, a 6-foot tall Teacher, Traveler, and Boston mama who’s created over 700 articles on Around the World “L” Travel and Life Blog since 2009. Do explore, share, and enjoy! [Learn More…]